Loss points to McCain's conservative difficulty
WASHINGTON -- Sen. John McCain's aides downplayed a thumping from Mike Huckabee in Kansas's caucuses Saturday, calling it a small bump on an inevitable road to the Republican presidential nomination. But the loss again underscored McCain's problems with staunch conservatives in his party.
Kansas weighed in first on a day in which Democratic Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois continued their back-and-forth fight for the nomination. Both parties had yet to complete Saturday caucuses in Washington state and primaries in Louisiana. Democrats also held a Saturday caucus in Nebraska.
McCain has roughly three-fifths of the delegates necessary to win the GOP nomination and leads Huckabee more than 3-to-1.
Anti-abortion activists and other social conservatives have had a big role in the Kansas GOP, and some of Huckabee's supporters say his appeal to them was a key to his victory in Saturday's lightly attended caucuses. Those who did vote chose the former Arkansas governor over McCain by more than 2-to-1, ignoring an endorsement of McCain by Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., who earlier dropped his bid for the nomination. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, finished third.
Huckabee's campaign chairman, Ed Rollins, and manager, Chip Saltzman, sent reporters a memo Saturday outlining how Huckabee could still win the nomination.
"The Republican National Convention is seven long months away; a lot can happen in that much time. A lot will happen," they wrote.
But other Huckabee supporters also realize that McCain's lead in delegates makes a Huckabee nomination unlikely. Primaries on Tuesday in Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia are likely to push McCain closer to clinching the GOP nomination, although Huckabee hopes to win in Virginia after winning five Southern states on Super Tuesday.
"We don't have any delusions. We know it is a long road and Huckabee is the underdog of underdogs," said Lucas Roebuck, a spokesman for the Internet group HucksArmy.com, which is separate from the campaign.
But Roebuck, a journalism professor at Northwest Nazarene University in Idaho, said a "strong turnout from values voters" in the Kansas caucuses should remind McCain and Republicans of the importance of social conservatives going forward.
McCain sought to assuage doubting conservative activists in a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday, arguing that while they had disagreed on important things in the past, he remained a committed conservative who could defeat either Clinton or Obama in November.
"We have admitted we are not the perfect caucus candidate," McCain adviser Jill Hazelbaker said after the Kansas results came in. "We expected to fall short in Kansas today. To that end it does not change where John McCain is."
Hazelbaker said McCain was the GOP's "presumptive nominee" whose immediate goal is to unite Republicans.
On the Democratic side, Maine caucuses on Sunday will be another test in that party's tough nomination fight.
But Tuesday's "Chesapeake primary" in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia is attracting both candidates and an advertising war in the Washington media market.
Clinton and Obama have campaign stops planned in both states in the final two days. In addition, former president Bill Clinton is expected to campaign in Maryland on Sunday after spending the morning attending services at two black churches in Washington.
McCain and Huckabee are both expected to have campaign appearances around Virginia on Monday.
McCain has been trying to wrap up the nomination, in part, by getting the Republican establishment behind him in primary and caucus states. On Saturday, former Gov. Jim Gilmore of Virginia endorsed him, and McCain also recently received the endorsement of former Sen. George Allen of Virginia. Former Maryland Gov. Bob Ehrlich, who had backed former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, has also endorsed McCain. But as the Arizona senator learned in Kansas on Saturday, endorsements don't always matter.